Some telling comments over the weekend made by the GOP “presumptive” nominee as reported by Byron York.
Romney said his campaign has been treated well by Fox News but that he needs to expand his audience beyond the leading cable news channel.
"Fox is watched by the true believers," Romney told donors, according to the Wall Street Journal. "We need to get the independents and the women."
Romney singled out CNN’s Wolf Blitzer as a good newsman, and today the campaign circulated a photo of Romney and wife Ann walking in Boston with ABC’s Diane Sawyer, with whom the couple is doing an extensive interview. So Romney is indeed broadening his media strategy.
Being treated well by Fox News is the understatement of the year. York, who is a Fox News contributor pointed out Romney’s erroneous view of Fox News.
A few years ago, Pew Research did a survey of the partisan makeup of television news audiences and found that, while a lot of Republicans do watch Fox, so do a lot of Democrats and independents. "Democrats comprise a larger share of the Fox News audience than Republicans do of CNN’s audience," Pew reported.
Pew found that 39 percent of regular Fox watchers are Republicans, while 33 percent are Democrats. For CNN, Pew found that 51 percent of viewers are Democrats, while just 18 percent are Republicans. According to Pew, 22 percent of Fox’s audience, and 23 percent of CNN’s, are independents.
I don’t want to launch a defense of Fox News, but rather point out Romney’s motive to want to pull away from Fox News – because it is watched by “true believers” and he wants to reach out to “independents.” I certainly agree that reaching out to independents is extremely important in a general election. However Romney still has a huge problem with the base of the party, the “true believers” so to speak. Perhaps he thinks they’ll fall in line.
I’m sure John McCain, Bob Dole and George H.W. Bush thought that too.
HT: Twitchy
8 comments
What is it that you want him to shore up the base?
Not avoid or ignore themfor starters.
What does that mean?
Not avoid them or ignore them? He’s avoided any town hall or event hosted by social conservatives as one example. That won’t endear us to him. He’s going to have a hard time Bob, and comments like this won’t help.
Doubt that most conservatives want to hear any more about social issues. Santorum did enough damage to the GOP brand by getting the conversation onto birth control and gay marriage. Maybe that is why Romney stays away from the that part of the base? Romney needs to stay on message – the economy, jobs and Obama’s miserable record in those areas.
I wouldn’t want to be linked to FOX “news” either! Smart move!
I don’t think this is much of a surprise. Romney has never really acted like a true conservative, and since he’s already become the frontrunner for the nomination while giving conservatism the cold shoulder, in his view, why should he change anything now?
I know lots of folks–including me–are praying that God will work a miracle to change the path that things appear to be headed down. It really does seem that that’s what it would take.
All he needs to do is stay conservative! That will draw in all the people. Most people in this country lean to the conservative side.
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